Julie Bowen felt "terrified" when she joined the cast of 'Modern Family'.

Julie Bowen struggled at the beginning of Modern Family

Julie Bowen struggled at the beginning of Modern Family

The 54-year-old actress - who has twins John and Gus, 13, and Oliver, 15, with her ex-husband Scott Phillips - eventually won two Emmys for her role as Claire Dunphy in the ABC sitcom but because she had made her name starring in dramas like 'ER' and 'Boston Legal', felt as if she "didn't belong", especially as she had recently become a mother.

Speaking on the 'I Choose Me' podcast, she told former 90210' star Jennie Garth: "I had babies, and I was breastfeeding, and I was going to work at 5 AM. I had three kids in diapers, and, you know, you're going to work every day going, 'Oh my gosh.' And you still need to be nice and professional, and you have to look good, and you're not sleeping at all.

"I felt like as much as, you know, getting up at 4:30 in the morning to get to work can be a pain, and not being with your kids is awful, I loved being there so much and I felt so much validation, and I felt so good.

"I spent the first year or year and a half in 'Modern Family' being terrified because everybody there was so funny and so good at what they did. I'm like, 'I don't belong here.'"

The former 'Ed' star - who was visibility pregnant when she filmed the 'Modern Family' pilot in 2009 - also admitted that she was "in awe" of how her younger castmates like Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Sarah Hyland managed to come with fame amid the rise of social media.

She said: "I was in awe of their composure ... they were living out loud and on social media and getting hate on social media. And I'm like, 'Maybe you should just not be on Twitter or Instagram, and maybe you shouldn't do those things.' And they were like, 'We're fine. We're fine."

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